The Journal's all-purpose sports report.

The NBA: Where Technicals Happen

In a preseason game against the Knicks on Wednesday night, Jermaine O’Neal was whistled for a foul. As NBA players, let alone veteran six-time All-Stars, are inclined to do, O’Neal protested somewhat, with a heavy emphasis on the “somewhat.” Referee Kevin Fitzgerald quickly served O’Neal with a technical foul. The same thing happened moments later to Kevin Garnett, whose shocked laughter at the technical quickly earned him an ejection. It sounds extreme, but it was really just a sign that things were going according to plan. “The message from the NBA to its players is clear,” USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt writes. “Adapt to new guidelines limiting complaints to referees or suffer the consequences — more technical fouls.”

Getty Images

Referees have whistled Kevin Garnett for arguing and laughing. He’ll have the whole season to smile and complete the technical-foul trifecta.

That the rule is unpopular among players is unsurprising, with the NBA Players Association threatening legal action against the on-court gag order. More surprising, perhaps, is the fact that the hoops commentariat doesn’t seem especially bullish on Commissioner David Stern’s latest attempt to regulate player behavior. At Yahoo!, Adrian Wojnarowski passionately condemns it as a desperate attempt by Stern to assert his will. “The commissioner is losing a grip on a younger, brasher generation of owners, and losing the respect of his players,” Wojnarowski writes. “Once, the players saw Stern as a kind of Don, a Godfather they had to respect. Once, they saw him as the commissioner of the NBA. Over time, he became just the commissioner of the owners. This is one more show of muscle for a commissioner who’s never had less within his sport.”

Deadspin’s Tommy Craggs sees the move less as an arbitrary attempt to consolidate power than a pre-emptive PR strike in an upcoming labor showdown between the league and its players. “Since the mid-1990s, the prevailing narrative of David Stern’s NBA has remained the same: The punks have run amok; the league has an ‘image problem’; and the only possible recourse is for the NBA to more closely regulate the players’ behavior and thus annex another small piece of their dwindling autonomy,” Craggs writes. “That’s how Stern sold the dress code to the public. That’s how he sold the last lockout. And that’s how he’ll sell the next one, too.”

There are some dissenters out there, and they hail from some of the basketball discourse’s more progressive corners. At CBS Sports, Matt Moore questions the NBA Players Association’s judgment in making on-court tantrums into a free speech issue. And at FanHouse, hoops freethinker Bethlehem Shoals dismisses the rule as more offseason kabuki from a commissioner long adept in that particular tactic. “[Stern makes] extreme overtures and overreactions that seek to nip public opinion in the bud,” Shoals writes. “But down the road, almost all of these lunges prove to be just that: stunts.”

* * *

There’s an easy way to explain what’s going on with the English Premier League’s Liverpool FC, but simply writing that former Texas Rangers owner Tom Hicks and partner George Gillett are being forced to sell the team by their creditors at the Royal Bank of Scotland doesn’t quite capture just how complicated and how strange the Liverpool saga has been. The long story short, as of Friday morning, is that Hicks and Gillett appear to have given in, and will sell Liverpool to NESV, a group headed by Boston Red Sox owner John Henry. But it was not as easy as that makes it sound.

* * *

There was the collapsing-footbridges thing. And also the uninhabitable athlete housing, and the monkey-related issues, and corruption allegations and a host of other problems. But bearing all those initial troubles in mind – troubles that seemed to create a very real chance that the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi might be canceled – it’s hard to argue that the Commonwealth Games, which wrapped up Thursday, weren’t a smashing success. Not only did the games go off more or less without a hitch, but the host nation made an unexpectedly strong showing and finished second in gold medals behind Australia. For the most part, though, the biggest and most pleasant surprise was that – after nothing seemed to go right leading up to the games – nothing really went wrong during the games themselves.

“Stadiums did not collapse. Terrorists did not strike. Fears of disease went mostly unrealized. And the closing ceremony was a stirring success,” Jim Yardley writes in the New York Times. “Indeed, some of the same officials who before the Games were fighting over who should be blamed are now fighting over who should get credit.”

* * *

Manny Pacquiao’s Nov. 13 fight against Antonio Margarito at Cowboys Stadium in Dallas would’ve been a big deal under any circumstances. There’s a WBC title belt at stake, for one thing, and Pacquiao’s global fame means that anything he does in the ring instantly earns “big deal” status. But given that this is Pacquiao’s first fight since being elected to parliament in the Philippines, the bout is especially meaningful for the legislator-pugilist. At ESPN, Peter Owen Nelson offers a fascinating look inside Camp Pacquaio, where days are split between reviewing appropriations hearings and sparring sessions.

Found a good column from the world of sports? Don’t keep it to yourself — write to us at dailyfixlinks@gmail.com and we’ll consider your find for inclusion in the Daily Fix. You can email David at droth11@gmail.com.

Comments (1 of 1)

The Shock Exchange caught up with Hall of Fame Beverage spokesman, Larry Johnson, this past Thursday at an event co-promoted by Packer Shoes and Fila. Johnson was on hand to promote the re-release of the Fila FX-100. The shoes will be offered in four different colors out of respect for Johnson's famous "4-point play" which sent the Indiana Pacers packing and propelled the NY Knicks to the NBA Finals. Larry was a super nice guy and was geniunely appreciative of the fact that his impact on the game still lasts -----> http://clicky.me/2WHg

SPORTS, THE JOURNAL WAY

Be sure to check your Daily Fix all week long. The Fix's daily rundown of the best sportswriting on the Web is joined by features such as The Count, a look at the most revealing sports stats, as well as regular live reports of major sports events. Tell us what you think of the Fix at dailyfixlinks@gmail.com.